Seeing as how Sword Art Online seems to be following the events from Vol. 1 and 2 of the light novel in chronological order will it make it to the end of the first light novel by the end of this first and hopefully not final season?

On a side note, for those who have not followed the light novels, vol. 2 is a compilation of side stories where as vol. one jumps a head two years after the first chapter if I remember correctly

And finally please if you must talk about events that have yet to happen in the anime make sure you post a warning as well as use the spoiler option. I think Sword Art Online is to wonderful to ruin for those who have not yet had the pleasure of reading or watching the anime.

I hope it follows the novels, but so many animes deviate from what they intend to do to create more revenue. If they stick to the story line then I doubt it will be concluded in a single season. Minimum would take 2 seasons which I'm sure is what they are planning for. Would be nice to see a new epic anime emerge but I just don't see it happening with SOA. Love the show though and glad its doing well.

I think they might be able to finish season 1 with Kirito finishing off Heathcliff and then waking up in the hospital then abruptly ending with him leaving the ward, but the anime hasn't even started the series of events that even lead to the 75th boss so I'm wondering where the anime is going to pick up on vol. 1's storyline.

Right now the anime is episode 5 and they are half way up the tower. It's different than /.hack cuz they focus on a lot of topics that gamers face online. Even if it ends, they can revive it like yugi oh! After the world tournament was over they held another tournament. The manga and the anime can both keep going as ling as writers keep the subject material fresh.

They are doing it chronologically to introduce all of the side characters, which really were additional material beyond the main story contained in Volume 1. That heavily implies that they already plan for the story to cover Volume 3+4 and they wanted to cover their introductions early.

A Murder Case in the Area, Warmth of the Heart, Sound of Water, Sound of Hammer, and hopefully some anime original material dealing with Laughing Coffin will take us up to ~13. Then they can devote the second half to all of Volume 1 + Morning Dew Girl.

I was thinking about this a bit earlier, and it seemed pretty hard to finish with vol. 1 on the 25th episode... much more likely to get through Vol 4 with the pace that they're going. This is what I was thinking in terms of episodes (though I'm unsure about the next few., and if those go faster they can add more details towards the end):

Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide

6: Part 2 of Murder in the Area
7: Warmth of the Heart part I
8: Warmth of the Heart part II
9: Battle against Laughing Coffin (if they want to set things up for the next series)
10: Ragout Rabbit, ends with the duel the next morning against cradil
11: Battle for the 74th... Colbert No!!!! Hes not a beater... he really is a CHEATER
12: Kirito loses to the Wuthering Heights Guy after trying to show off to his woman
13: Kirito joins up with the KoB, Cradil dies, "I want to be with Asuna tonight"...
14: (marriage and) Mountain Dew Girl Part I
15: Mountain Dew Girl Part II: The Extremening
16: The fisherman, call to the 75th floor battle, maybe even the battle itself
16.5: (actually it would be 13.5?)
17: Final battle, Kirito kills the orange cat guy (not garfield), the aftermath, kirito awakens

18: Reality (introduce Suguha/introduce plot) ends with dive into ALO...
19: Talks to Yui,Saves Lyfa,Kirito puts the moves on Lyfa (or similar),checks out sylph village
20: Asuna and Oberon, Journey to the tree, Underground Battle, Lyfa gets word from Recon on the traitor...
21: Kirito races to meeting, Eugene Battle, catgirl fanservice , Asuna breaks free, fall into a hole...
22: Elephant-headed squid episode (which everyone thinks is filler?), up to tree village...
23: Suguha visits Asuna in the hospital and gets depressed, kirito gets the GM card, first attempt at the tree battle, ends with "Why is it always Asuna!?"...
24: Teary moments of confession, Recon flirts it up, second attempt at the tree battle, Kirito uses the GM card...
25: Fight with Oberon/Back to Reality/party at the Dicey/view of everyone hanging out during closing credits (as Aincrad appears in the sky)

really this anime is doing well? i thought it was just a .hack/tower of druaga rip off

I like .hack, but SOA is way better in my opinion. Not an easy thing for me to say. But, it's true. I don't really care about ToD, I thought it was boring personally. Nine episodes in, did little to convince me otherwise.

SOA has kept my interest since the first episode. Even if the odd episode feels rushed. It doesn't really surprise me it's doing well. The show had a strong start. And the light novels look to be popular.

nope. if you read the lns youll see its way diffrent than any other game based anime. i see in the future itll be like familiar of zero and shakugan no shana...it has enough material and sales to have atleast 3 seasons following the diffrent arcs. i just wish index would get more seasons. 22 volumes pluss the nt series, and all the side stuff. sigh....if i ran a company id animate all my faves so fans can see ther fave characters in action.